Kenny Ladler was placed on the one-game injured list when the Game 17 depth chart was released Friday morning.

And now there are two.

At the start of the season head coach Jason Maas put the names of all the players chosen to start the season on a magnetic board in the Edmonton Eskimos dressing room.

Only two have made it through to the last home game Saturday at Commonwealth Stadium against the Calgary Stampeders.

Reilly. O’Donnell.

They’re the sole survivors in Maas’ second annual BONE Crushers Club where the members of the Brotherhood Of Nasty Eskimos who start all 18 games will be presented with prizes.

Reilly and O’Donnell next week will likely become Edmonton nominees for CFL Awards with the best chance of winning — quarterback Reilly as Most Outstanding Player and O’Donnell as Most Outstanding Canadian and Offensive Lineman.

Ladler has a good chance to represent the Eskimos as top defensive player but he won’t be playing against the Stampeders.

“Ladner has been dealing with things all year like you’d expect any guy who has played 32 games of football for us and this year 16 games straight,” said Maas. “It just got to the point where he’s dealing with little issues that we felt had got to the point where they were hurting him.

“A week of rest from him is probably going to be best for him going down the stretch.”

To not have a single player start all 17 games on defence is beyond belief.

And to have only two make on offence is almost as mind-boggling.

“It’s been pretty crazy with injuries. But now, to end up with two guys starting from the start of the season until now is pretty staggering,” said the six-foot-eleven 350-pound pretty much indestructible left guard.

O’Donnell has never missed a game.

“Knock on wood,” he said.

Edmonton’s offensive lineman nominee once before, in 2013, not only has made it through to Game 17 still starting, but he’s having a career year.

“I think it’s been my best season so far. I think it’s been pretty good. I had my sights set on an All-star spot and possibly the offensive lineman of the year, but mostly Grey Cup. It would be something to get the whole trifecta but if I have to settle with one I’ll take the Grey Cup,” he said.

Reilly was one of 16 Esks to start all 18 games last year is on the verge of putting up his biggest numbers yet. And he gets it with Maas’ now ridiculously exclusive club.

“Coach Maas challenge to the team with it was that football is a physical game and if you’re a starter in the CFL with small rosters, one of the best things you can be for your team is available,” Reilly said. “It’s extremely hard to stay healthy for an entire season. When you play 18 games, your body is mangled at the end of the year. You may be ‘healthy’ but you’re fighting through different stuff. His thing was that was for guys who are capable of doing that, he wanted to make a reward and be recognized for that.

“We have a big board in our locker room that had all the guys who were starters for the first game of the season. Each week he updates it. Each week you walk by the board and there’s three or four guys missing. He has little magnets with the names. He doesn’t reorganize them on the board. Our three names stay exactly in the same spot they were at the end of the season.”

Reilly said no Eskimo will forget this year but the thing now is to make it unforgettable.

“You can’t prepare for this. You just go through it.”

Reilly said the bottom line is how much better it will make it if the Eskimos win the Grey Cup.

“When we won the Grey Cup in 2015, I remember thinking I’d never be able to have the same amazing feeling to win it again because I wouldn’t go through the same extreme I went through that year. I had to come back from a nine-week injury and deal with the mental and emotional part of it as well as the physical part to return to play,” said the quarterback who suffered a knee injury in the first game and returned to start the Labour Day Rematch and led the Eskimos to eight straight wins at the end of the season as well as the West Final and the Grey Cup.

“To climb that mountain and to be standing holding that Cup was such an amazing feeling.

“If we win the championship this year I don’t think there will have been a team that has won it, ever, in the history of it that will take as much pride as we will in doing it.

“If we can finish this thing off the right way, I don’t know how there will be a story to top it.”

This Week's Flyers

Comments

We encourage all readers to share their views on our articles and blog posts. We are committed to maintaining a lively but civil forum for discussion, so we ask you to avoid personal attacks, and please keep your comments relevant and respectful. If you encounter a comment that is abusive, click the "X" in the upper right corner of the comment box to report spam or abuse. We are using Facebook commenting. Visit our FAQ page for more information.